


Should I Cool it or Should I Blow?

by caer



Category: Southern Vampire Mysteries - Charlaine Harris, True Blood
Genre: 5 Times, Attempt at Humor, Drama, F/M, Five Times Format, Jealousy, angst if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-14
Updated: 2016-10-14
Packaged: 2018-08-22 08:06:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8278762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caer/pseuds/caer
Summary: Four times Eric gets jealous and one time he doesn't (sort of).





	

**Author's Note:**

> **Title:** Should I Cool it or Should I Blow?  
>  **Word Count:** 2 793  
>  **A/N:** No, I'm not on a writing spree. I was trying to write a proper 5+1, but part VI grew into 'Here at the End of All Things' which was supposed to be the one time Sookie gets jealous, and then I couldn't think of another, so I tried changing part V to the 'one time he doesn't' and, well, here we are. Not sure part V fits, but it is what it is. I also wanted to write something on the lighter side because my WIP five times is kind of sucking me dry emotionally. Part V got in the way of that, also. 
> 
> Those unfamiliar with Five Times Format, each section is its own AU. Normally it goes '5 times (insert theme) happened and one time it didn't.' But I like to sum up to 5, not 6, hence why this is 'four times Eric gets jealous and one time he doesn't.'

 

 

**i.**

 

 

It should have been the best night of his existence.

 

After years of hosting parties in his honour, the Count himself had finally made an appearance at _Fangtasia_.

 

At first, Eric couldn’t have been more thrilled.

 

Now?

 

He looks over from his corner at the throng of adoring fans surrounding the other vampire, who has taken Eric’s place on the dais, and his scowl deepens even more. He doesn’t care about the vacuous simpletons throwing themselves at the Count’s feet or the fact that he has been essentially been usurped in his own bar; as far as he’s concerned, the latter is an honour and he has no shortage in the former.

 

No, what has him grinding his teeth is another certain individual sitting atop the dais next to the guest of the hour. An individual who is wearing a sexy, little red dress that he has every intention of peeling off later; who is giggling and touching her long elegant fingers on arms that are not his.

 

He tosses back half a bottle of Tru Blood and slams it down on the table harder than necessary. And then proceeds to glare at it since he can’t very well do so at the one who deserves it.

 

That would be ridiculous after years of near idolization. Pam would never let him live it down.

 

He’s still glaring when one half of the source of his irritation slides into the booth opposite him.

 

“You were right, Eric,” Sookie says, words a little breathy, with eyes still glued to the ornate throne and the body in it. “Vlad really is somethin’.”

 

Vlad? _Vlad?_ He nearly chokes on his own tongue. Eric himself hadn’t been given leave to refer to him as such. Suddenly he’s not quite sure which he’s jealous of: Sookie’s attention or that she commands the Count’s confidence.

 

Possibly both.

 

He looks at her. Flushed cheeks and neck. Slightly breathless. Eyes a little glazed.

 

Perhaps she’s fallen under the Count’s thrall, after all.

 

Eric eagerly reaches across and pinches her arm.

 

“Ow! Quit it.” She smacks his fingers away and he retreats into his sullen glare once again. All her then.

 

“You’re smitten,” he accuses.

 

“What? Don’t be silly,” she chides but her voice is a little too high for his liking and there’s nervous laughter that follows. Abruptly, she leans forward, pupils expanding as she whispers, “I’m not…am I?”

 

“I think you are, lover,” he says grudgingly, and hears the pout behind his words.

 

“Well, I do feel a little,” here she leans towards him again, finger and thumb held apart fractionally to illustrate her point, finishing her confession in a conspiratorial whisper, “ _tingly_.”

 

That’s it.

 

Eric hauls her up out of the booth and pushes her towards the back exit. “Time to go home.”

 

“What? No! Eric,” she sputters. “It’s not like I’ll _do_ anything.” But it’s a useless battle. Pam materializes at their side, Sookie’s coat in hand and a shit-eating grin on her face.

 

“Pam, take her home. Sookie is feeling a bit…overwhelmed.” He side-eyes her as he says it, daring her to argue.

 

“With pleasure,” his child purrs, then barks a laugh when Sookie sticks out her tongue at him before both disappear from his view.

 

Now to deal with _Vlad_.

 

 

 

 

 

**ii.**

 

 

Soft, pink flesh reaches out to lick the stiff peak, catching the creamy white substance at the top before darting back behind full lips.

 

Eric nearly groans out loud.

 

Being subject to such torture is unbearable.

 

He watches Sookie’s eyes dance with delight at the taste, her tongue venturing out again to savour the flavour likely still on her lips.

 

Her hold tightens and she dips her head eagerly, licks increasing in pace now. Most of the white fluid dribbling down from the top is caught in her waiting mouth. A trickle somehow evades the trap and it’s a few long seconds of Eric watching it stream down her hand, down her wrist, before she realizes the sticky mess. Breaking away from the principal object in her grasp, she brings her arm up to her mouth, and then proceeds to suck clean the skin.

 

This time, he really does groan out loud.

 

“What was that?” She looks over at him but he shakes his head, not wanting to distract her.

 

Soon her attention is focused again, and she hums happily as she continues her conquest, oblivious to Eric’s anguish. When the entire top half has disappeared inside her mouth, her dainty teeth bite into the cuff. A little too forcefully, it seems, as a gush of thick, white fluid bursts onto her hand, and then she’s working quickly to catch all the drops. The fissure leaves her no choice but to down and swallow everything in one go. Quite impressively, too.

 

“Uh, you okay there?” She raises an eyebrow afterwards at his expression.

 

He can’t help it; Eric eyes her empty hand forlornly.

 

Never in all his nights did he ever think he would be so envious of a human confectionary treat.

 

He clears his throat and ignores the tingling of his gums, and offers to buy another. She hems and haws for a bit before acquiescing and Eric rises from the bleachers with enthusiasm. She mistakes it for enthusiasm for the community baseball game she has dragged him to, and Eric finds he is hard-pressed to correct her.

 

Sookie is absolutely _obscene_ in the way she devours an ice cream cone.

 

“Vanilla,” he tells the vendor. “Make it a double scoop.”

 

 

 

 

 

**iii.**

 

 

She walks into the bar with Alcide in tow and it annoys him more than it should.

 

“All right, let’s do this quick,” she huffs; Eric has half a mind to retort _On your back or mine?_ Instead, he smiles with all his teeth. Minus the pointy ones.

 

“Sookie,” he purrs, hitting just _that_ note; hears with momentary satisfaction the quickening of her heartbeat in response. “Brought a playmate?” The smile on his face turns predatory as he takes in what she’s wearing: a rich blue dress that hangs off her at all the right spots, a plunging neckline to her breasts, and strappy heels on her feet which bring her to the perfect height for kissing. Her hair is done up, held in place at the top to draw the gaze down the smooth expanse of her neck.

 

She looks fucking delicious.

 

“Cut the crap, Eric,” she says with a roll of the eyes, and normally that dispassionate response would urge him further to tease out her spirited indignation, but then he catches sight of clasped hands between them and his good mood at being in her company shrivels up.

 

Eric wishes he could reach into the past and fucking throttle himself for introducing the pair.

 

Herveaux gives a cool nod his way, not even slightly fazed at Eric’s lack of manners.

 

“My office,” Eric indicates towards the back with his head, where the new staff are waiting to be read.

 

Sookie nods approvingly at the quickness of which this meeting is proceeding and turns around to hand her purse to her date.

 

Eric drinks in her actions with unimaginable thirst: how she leans in; a hand smoothing down his chest; the soft smile and words as she tells him to behave himself; quiet affection in her eyes at the gruff reply.

 

And he finds himself… _wanting_.

 

And not to just fuck her senseless.

 

But her caress of words rolling over him; the warmth of her under his body; the pleasure of knowing she looks only at him, touches only him, thinks about him and no other. He wants her to want it, too – to want it with him and not with fucking Bill Compton or Alcide Herveaux, or whomever else lurked in the wings.

 

He has experienced the feeling of possessiveness before; he has lived a long life, after all. But where Sookie is concerned, especially in the intimacy of another, it is something darker, something more desirous that awakens from its slumber and prowls restlessly inside him.

 

The beast won’t be satisfied until she comes to him willingly.

 

But that doesn’t mean he can’t offer temptation.

 

Eric holds an arm out to her, playing the gentleman, knowing her manners will override her personal objection of the moment. He’s right, of course, and she takes his arm after a moment’s hesitation, even going so far as to make an effort to smile pleasantly up at him.

 

He guides her to his office, bending his head to murmur something suitably crass and flirtatious in her ear; she reds up like a tomato, rolling her eyes again as she walks through the open door, but he catches the grin pulling at her lips.

 

Small steps.

 

 

 

 

 

**iv.**

 

 

He’s waiting out the hours until his obligation in _Fangtasia_ is up.

 

Sookie had arrived earlier, and Pam had promptly commanded her attention. The two had sauntered off, arm in arm, citing ‘girl talk,’ and now are ensconced in his booth, heads bent together. The image elicits a fond smile from him.

 

He’s playing a round of solitaire on his phone when a distinct piece of conversation reaches his ears.  
  
“…slept over this weekend…”

 

Eric looks up sharply.

 

Pam’s grin is a little too big for his liking.

 

The music pulses impossibly loud and he only catches just the few words from Sookie’s mouth.

 

“…cuddled all day…”

 

Who was his lover entertaining while he was preoccupied these past two days?

 

“He’s just the sweetest thing…”

 

Something inside him rankles at the adoration in her voice. There was no mistaking the meaning behind _that_.

 

Eric hears no more as the much blares increasingly louder, leaving him to stew over the incriminating information.

 

He’s still thinking about it later, in bed, under her.

 

If there was another, how could he not have felt it? The bond should have given them away. The thought troubles him greatly and he frowns.

 

“Eric, a little help?”

 

His head snaps down to where she’s hovering above him, struggling to pull his shirt over his torso. Eric sits up, still frowning, and decides to give her the chance to come clean. “How was your weekend, lover?”

 

“Fine,” she answers, tossing his shirt to the floor. Her hands running over his chest prove a momentary distraction before he remembers he is less than happy with her.

 

“Nothing exciting?” he hedges.

 

“Nope.”

 

The corners of his mouth pull down even more severely as he doesn’t get the answer he’s seeking.

 

“Are you sure?” he presses.

 

“Eric – honey, work with me here.”

 

It’s then he notices she has already worked his belt off and is stuck in the process of tugging his jeans down over his hips.

 

He lifts his hips like she wants, but then uses the momentum to roll off the bed entirely. Her anticipation changes to disbelief when she realizes that he is, in fact, not shedding his pants.

 

Eric crosses his arm. “Anything you want to tell me, lover?” He tries not to sound miffed, but also, admittedly, it’s not his best effort.

  
  
Sookie’s mouth opens and closes soundlessly several times, and during any other instance he might have laughed. Eventually she works out a tentative, “No?”

 

Resisting the urge to snarl, he spits out, “You didn’t have a… _guest_ at your house?”

 

Her face flits through several emotions, starting at realization before unexpectedly settling on annoyance.

 

She crosses her arms as well. “Yes. What about it?” In hindsight, he should have seen the trap for what it was, but, during the moment, all he hears is the challenge and charges mulishly forward.

 

“So you don’t deny it?”

  
  
“Why would I?” she answers coolly.

 

He stares.

 

She stares back.

 

Eric is the first to crack.

 

“You cuddled!” Eric reveals his sorest point, aware of how ridiculous it sounds. But.

 

Meaningless sex he could have moved past. Perhaps. At the least, would have understood it on some level.

 

But cuddling is _intimate_ , a betrayal more keenly felt.

 

Sookie bursts out laughing.

 

“I’m sorry, but,” she chuckles. “Ask me who.”

 

Of course he wants to know, but wants to do what she asks even less. So he stubbornly doesn’t say anything, glaring at her instead.

 

“Come on, Eric,” she cajoles. “Just ask.” Her grin is as wide as Texas.

 

“Who?” he says grudgingly.

 

“Hunter,” Sookie replies, eyebrow arched.

 

Hunter? Where has he heard –

 

“Your nephew.” Just like that, the tension drains right out of him. “He stayed the weekend.”

 

“Yeah, we watched movies and cuddled on the couch.”

 

“Then why – ”

 

Fuckin’ Pam.

 

“I’m going to kill her,” he growls.

 

Sookie smiles sheepishly. “Sorry, I should have realized something was up when she kept asking me to repeat myself louder because she ‘couldn’t hear me’.”

 

His phone buzzes on the dresser and there is no doubt it’s his child calling to cackle from the other end.

 

“You big oaf.” Sookie pads up to him, slipping arms around his waist to grope his ass fondly. “You think I would cheat on this?”  
  
“The evidence was quite compelling,” Eric grumbles.

 

She stands on her tip-toes to kiss him and he lets her.

 

He will deal with his child later.

 

 

 

 

 

**v.**

 

 

He flutters kisses down the length of her, a faint tingle to his lips as her body hums under him.

 

So much warmth – life bursting out of every pore.

 

The rumble in his chest is heavy, unbreaking, as he breathes in grass and earth and the favours of the sun on her skin.

 

She looks up at him with sated eyes, blond curls a mess above her head joined by outstretched arms, lips swollen, glistening, breasts rubbed raw and heaving from his attentions – a tapestry made real.

 

His name from her mouth is a long, drawn out needy sound. As though he is as essential to her as the air she breathes and this is exactly what he wants. To be consumed by her, fill her, so she is sustained on him and him alone. Eric groans at the thought.

 

With fingers threaded together, he rocks against her, the head of him teasing the most sensitive part of her body.

 

He does it again, and a small gasp escapes this time before she pulls her lower lip between her teeth.

 

Again – and then he’s sliding _in_ , _in_ , _in_ , muscles flexing around him, taking him deeper and he feels as though she is the endless sea and he is drowning in her depths.

 

Their moans are indistinguishable as he pulls back, then drives in at a languorous pace, over and over with her heartbeat pounding so loud in his ears, Eric could swear it’s his own.

 

She is so hot beneath him, around him, a golden glow to her skin, and he’s reminded how temporary she is in his world.

 

He thrusts hard, making her moan appreciatively.

 

She doesn’t belong to him, not truly.

 

Her soul walks under the light of the sun, and her body lost to time.

 

Eric buries his nose in the crook of her neck, inhaling the sweet scent of sunshine, and surges into her with such force her nails dig themselves into his knuckles, and she mumbles incoherent praise in his ear.

 

Her heart he may hold in his hands, but what does it mean when half her life is spent out of reach from him? When he is loath to share her with her beloved sunlight? When she doesn’t love him enough to want him as much as the rays of warmth that kiss her skin?

 

Eric mouths at her throat hungrily, sucking and nipping his frustrations into a bruising mark along the juncture of her shoulder.

 

How can he make her see she would burn gloriously in the darkness? That she wouldn’t desire the sun because she’d be Sol herself, not even Arvakr and Alsivor able to outrun the reaches of her majestic light? And he would bend his knee, forever an acolyte kneeling at the alter of her eternal beauty, forsaking the night and moon for a chance to bask in the warmth of her grace.

 

He crushes his mouth to hers then, sucking on her tongue, feeling her stretch and dig her heels in the dip of his back, demanding her satisfaction from him.

 

They move together, crashing into each other like waves of a thunderous sea, uncontrollable and unrelenting in what they want – cresting, falling, with a storm roiling through their bodies.

 

When he feels her come undone, teeth plunged in her neck, bursts of lightning under his eyelids, he thinks maybe he’s wrong. Maybe he’s Skoll, destined to forever chase her light, to descend them into chaos and oblivion because he won’t rest until he has her.

 

He would give her eternity if she’d just let him.

 

She would be _magnificent_.

 

 

+

fin.

**Author's Note:**

> Humour is a challenge for me. Typos - if you see them, let me know. 
> 
> Comments and kudos are love.


End file.
